


And It's Like No Time Has Passed

by Kacka



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M, Post-Season/Series 04, post 4x13
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-26
Updated: 2017-05-26
Packaged: 2018-11-05 01:48:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,769
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11003448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kacka/pseuds/Kacka
Summary: Bellamy is back on the ground, and he's just how Clarke remembers him, if a little more grown up.





	And It's Like No Time Has Passed

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't really spec so much as wish fulfillment, but it came partially out of a conversation with @craniumhurricane about how they're 23ish/29ish after the time jump and how that makes them feel a little bit more like proper adults

"Predictable."

Bellamy looks up like he's been caught, pushing up his glasses and smiling guiltily. For all the times Clarke drew him over the past six years-- on every spare piece of scrap paper she could find, every blank stretch of wall in the lab-- she never imagined him like this: hair shaggy and long, the sharpness of his jaw shadowed with stubble, wearing _glasses._

Smiling, easy and relaxed.

It feels wrong that most of her memories of him are shadowed by tension, broad shoulders pulled tight, jaw muscle jumping, gaze hard and canny. A soldier in wartime. Her heart aches that she gets to see him like this, gets to see him at all.

"What are you trying to say, Princess?"

His voice makes her breath catch.

Six years of talking to an empty radio channel, hoping against hope that she'd hear his voice coming through, but never really expecting it to. And now he's here, and he's answering back, and it's just-- it's a lot to take in.

"Leave it to Bellamy Blake to find his way straight to the armory," she says with feigned exasperation, and he ducks his head, smiling. "Most of your crew is enjoying the feast we prepared for you guys, but not you."

"You think I'm gonna waste my first chance in six years to really get away from Murphy?"

Clarke laughs and comes to stand next to him, watching as he meticulously cleans each piece of the gun before him, fingers deft and sure. It's pretty hot, if Clarke is honest with herself.

And she's learned to be very honest with herself the past few years.

They're barely touching, his arm skimming hers every time he moves, but it sets her heart racing fast as ever.

_Get it together, Griffin. You're not seventeen anymore._

"I'm surprised you lasted this long without a gun," she teases. "I would've thought the separation anxiety would drive you out of your mind."

"Who says it didn't?"

His voice is light, joking, and he always did have a morbid sense of humor, but it rings too true for Clarke to brush it off. She leans further into him, letting her hip rest flush against his. He leans back, with less hesitation even than it took for him to wrap his arms around her, clutching her close to him when she threw herself at him just a few hours earlier.

There had been awe and disbelief, her throat stinging and her eyes blurring with unshed tears, then. Her hands re-learning the planes of his back, her lips fitting to that spot on his shoulder they always found. Now, all she has is a contentment that reverberates throughout her body, the kind only Bellamy has ever been able to give her.

They haven't had time to talk about it yet, but they will. In fact, Clarke hopes there will be time to talk, and time to do much more than talking. To tell him all the things her words, in thousands of days' worth of radio transmissions, could never fully encompass.

For now, she just wants to be near him.

"I like these," she says, tapping the frames of his glasses and refusing to let herself get bogged down by memories of losing her own mind, even if she did eventually find it again. "You guys do a lot of shopping on the ring?"

He smirks at her, his hands still working. "There was a lot left behind up there. More than I expected. Didn't seem like anyone would mind."

"What else do you expect from a bunch of delinquents, anyway? I'm sure you guys did whatever the hell you wanted."

He rolls his eyes, but he's smiling at the callback. "More like whatever the hell we could think of. You name it, we tried it. Played every game we knew, told every story we'd ever heard, and when we ran out, we made stuff up."

"At least you had each other," she says, not even thinking of how he must hear that, but kicking herself internally when he winces, freezes.

"Clarke--"

"I didn't mean it that way. I meant-- I really am glad you had each other, Bellamy."

His jaw works but he remains otherwise still. So Clarke reaches over and takes the gun from his hand, piecing the last of it together and popping in the magazine with a satisfying _click_.

"You didn't have anyone," he says, and his voice sounds raw. "Or-- I thought you wouldn't, even if you did survive--"

"I did survive, and I did have someone."

"Madi."

She nods and begins to disassemble the gun again. Some days she'd do it over and over and over until her fingers were blistered and her joints ached from the repetition.

"And the other nightbloods, but... she's mine. You'll like her. She's--" She cocks her head. "I was going to say sweet, but that's not the best word for it. She likes stories, and learning things. She's so sharp, Bell. She's-- she's a survivor. Like us."

Clarke can feel his eyes on her as her hands speed up, as she speaks fondly of the girl she found so many years ago now, when she was just a tiny, dirty, scrappy little kid. She'd know the weight of his gaze anywhere, even after so long.

"She sounds great," he says, voice rumbling and warm in the way that it gets when he smiles. "I never pictured you being good with kids. Is that terrible?"

She huffs, half a laugh. "Kids are just smaller people, what's so hard about them?"

"You know, you're right. I don't know how every parent ever got it so wrong." His finger comes up and loops itself in the strands of red. "I see you've still got a little bit of a wild side."

"Do you like it?"

He drops his hand.

When she looks over at him, she has to bite back a laugh. Of all the things today to make him look bowled over, that's one she didn't see coming.

"Do _I_ like it? What does that matter?"

"That's always mattered to me," she says, amused. "I care what you think more than pretty much anyone."

He swallows and combs his fingers through her hair, more serious than he had been at-- well, at her age. "I do like it."

"Good." She smiles when his hand drops at the ends of her hair like he's expecting it to be longer. "Come on, I want to show you something."

He follows her out of the armory-- really, just a section of the cave that's dry enough and dark enough that Clarke felt it was safe to hide the guns there. She doesn't like using them, but she likes having them. And it felt like a waste to leave them in the lab.

The small band of nightbloods are wary of the newcomers but thrilled to see new faces. Some of them are chattering excitedly with Harper and Emori by the fire, one or two arguing with Raven (but seemingly enjoying themselves, so Clarke leaves them be), Murphy and Echo standing off to the side and eyeing the whole thing skeptically.

"An unlikely pair, huh?" Bellamy says, having followed her line of sight. She nods. "I thought I'd be keeping the two of them away from each other's throats for five years, but they found an... understanding of sorts. They're both--"

"Cynics?"

"Outcasts."

She hums. "Like recognizes like."

Her heart swells as her eyes catch on Madi sitting cross-legged next to Monty, drinking in his every word with that look in her eye that means she already has a million questions.

"Be honest," says Bellamy, stealing her attention back. As if he ever really lost it. "Were you just trying to get me to the party?"

Clarke laughs. "No, it's this way. Come on."

It's easy to pick their way through the dark of the forest on a night like tonight, when the moon is full and illuminating the path for them. It also helps that there's not a tree more than six years old. Even the tallest now are shorter and less full than what used to live in this earth.

"I keep looking around like I'm expecting to recognize where we are," he grumbles behind her. Clarke grins.

"Took me a while to get used to the new landmarks too. I got lost so many times in the first few months after the death wave passed. It took me forever to even find the bunker, much less recognize it under all the rubble." He quiets at that and Clarke works very hard not to turn around and scrutinize his expression.

"Will you take me there?" He asks at last.

"How's tomorrow?"

Bellamy snorts. "I don't know, Princess, I'll have to check my calendar."

She moves a branch out of her way and lets go, smiles when she hears him sputter as it whacks him on the forehead.

"You were saying?"

"Where the hell are we--"

His words falter as they emerge into the clearing by the water. It's the shore of a small lake, stunning on its own in the daytime, but at night, breathtaking.

"What is it?" He breathes, crouching by a rock to get a better look. Strewn across the shoreline, little blue points of light glow in the water, making the lake look almost as if it's made of starlight.

Clarke takes off her shoes and socks, climbing to her favorite rock where she and Madi like to dangle their feet in the water and patting the spot next to her for Bellamy to join.

"Bioluminescent algae," she explains. "The night I found this was-- It was the first night I really had hope for the world again. The first good night in a while."

Bellamy settles next to her, his knees and ankles bumping against her legs, his pinky finger crossed over hers as they brace themselves on the rock.

"I tried to teach Madi about the constellations," she says softly, tipping her head up to look at the sky. An old habit, not from watching for stars or clouds, but watching for him. For Raven and Monty and even Murphy, way up there above the earth as it was reborn from the ashes.

"Tried?" He prompts.

"I was never very good at them. I ended up making things up a lot."

"Finally, something you suck at," he teases. "Show me what you came up with."

Clarke scans the skies, then reaches up, pointing. "Those over there, and then the cluster next to it? And the ones further down? Those are the white lilies. I would tell her about the girl who fell from the sky and the warrior who fell in love with her, how they'd meet in secret, and then once everyone found out, how they tried to become a bridge between his kru and hers."

"I like that one."

"So do I."

They sit for a moment, lost in the past, and then his hand moves to cover hers, squeezing gently.

"What else?"

"The bright one there, and the ones all around it? That's the commander's flame and the thirteen clans." She pauses. "I never told her the end of that story."

"I don't blame you."

"The ones next to it kind of form-- that line and that line and they cross?" She says, pointing and waiting for him to nod. "That's King Roan's stupid-looking crown."

He laughs, sudden and sharp. "Which stories did you tell her to go with that one?"

"All of them," she smiles. "Another outcast, who would've been a far better ruler than his mother if he'd gotten a real chance."

"He kidnapped you and stabbed me," Bellamy points out, mild.

Clarke just smiles. "I told her that story too. She always liked the part where he spared your life."

She doesn't tell him Madi liked it because she thought it _romantic_. That, she'll keep to herself. At least for now.

"You told her about me?"

"Duh." She rests her head on his shoulder, ostensibly to get a view of the sky closer to his, but really just-- because she can. "See those there? That upside-down-V?"

"Those?" He tries to point but Clarke shakes her head, places her hand over his to move it herself.

"Those. That's the mountain. It's-- She liked that one, even though I didn't. The story about the brave spy who snuck into the belly of the beast and wouldn't leave until he got everyone out." She smiles. "Most of my stories actually feature you, one way or another."

"You're raising this kid on tragedies." Bellamy's voice is hoarse, his hand rough when he turns it over and catches hers. She laces her fingers in his and holds tight.

"I'm raising her on heroes."

"I can only imagine what you've told her about me," he jokes, trying to bring the mood back up. "Good thing I'm here now to set the record straight."

"Good thing you're here now, period. Full stop."

"Always gotta contradict me."

"Some things never change," she says, cheerful, and is gratified when he laughs.

"But some things do change. And that's one of the things rebellious teenagers tend to grow out of."

Clarke laughs and picks her head up. "I think it's too late for me to grow into a new personality. Sorry."

He shakes his head, but he's got a familiar gleam in his eye as he watches her that makes her warm from the inside out. "I'll let it slide, but only because I'm pretty sure that stubbornness is what's kept you alive all this time."

Clarke smiles ruefully.

"That and hope."

The air between them is charged, Bellamy understanding her in the way that only Bellamy can.

He takes his free hand and runs it over her hair again, lingering when he reaches the nape of her neck. It gives her enough confidence to lean toward him, to brush her nose against his. His hand guides her to him, draws her in so he can kiss her forehead, and then her cheek, and as he goes for the other side, she intercepts him, catching his lips with hers.

It's not flat-out passion, as she sometimes imagined her reunion with Bellamy, and it's not an overflow of emotion, of relief that the other is alive and that they're together once more. The undercurrent of all those things is there, certainly, but to Clarke the kiss overwhelms and consumes her because it's a deliberate _choosing_.

It's not the Bellamy he was, kissing the Clarke she used to be. It isn't the two of them trying to make up for lost time, for lost chances. For what they ought to have done, if they'd known it was the last time they'd see each other for over six years.

It's the Bellamy he has become and the Clarke she is now, coming together and finding that they still fit in all the best ways. There's enough of the old Bellamy that Clarke can still recognize him, but as his lips open for her, his fingers press firm and steady against her skin, both of them pouring everything they have into the kiss, she can't wait to get to know the rest of him. To take this chance from the beginning, instead of waiting this time.

It's slow and heady and deep and by the time he pulls back, she's out of breath.

She rests her forehead against his and smiles.

"You were right," she breathes. "Some things do change."

He laughs and kisses her jaw. "The only thing that's changed is that I'm finally letting myself act on my impulses."

"And I fully encourage that." She steals another kiss, means for it to be quick, but gets caught up easily. It's another few minutes before she has the presence of mind to break it again. "I'm keeping you this time," she warns him. "You know that, right?"

"Good, because I'm not going anywhere."

"This is earth, you can't promise that." she laughs, the slightest hint of bitterness and fear tinting her joy. She doesn't want to imagine losing him, not after she just got him back, but she can't quite help herself. She breathes him in, grounding herself, centering herself in his presence.

"You can't promise that," she says again, calmer this time.

"Maybe not," he agrees, gentle. "But I can promise that whatever happens next, we'll face it side by side."

Clarke nods, curling her fingers behind his ear.

"Together."

"Yeah," he says fondly, with a smile she can feel. "Together."


End file.
